Method for accelerating web server by predicting hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests and web server enabling the method

ABSTRACT

Provided is a method of improving performance of a web server by predicting a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request and the web server enabling the method, including transmitting, to an HTTP requester, at least one web content among web contents including static web contents and dynamic web contents in response to an HTTP request, selecting, from the web contents, a required web content to be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester and a potential web content to be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester, determining, among the potential web content, a web content to be preloaded, and storing, in a document cache, the required web content and the web content to be preloaded.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the priority benefit of Korean PatentApplication No. 10-2013-0084195, filed on Jul. 17, 2013, in the KoreanIntellectual Property Office, the disclosure of which is incorporatedherein by reference.

BACKGROUND

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a method of improving performance of aweb server by predicting Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) requests andthe web server enabling the method.

2. Description of the Related Art

Recently, rapid developments are being made in technology related to theWorld Wide Web, or web, and accordingly, attempts to connect a humanbeing to a machine, a machine to a machine, and a device to a devicethrough the web are ongoing. Also, with the introduction of the web,numerous network communication protocols in an existing computer networkare being replaced with web protocols and thus, penetration andinfluence of the web are expected to be furthered moving forward. Inline with such a trend, functions and performance of the web have beenextended based on the establishment of web standards, for example,Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) 5 and next generation HypertextTransfer Protocol (HTTP).

Also, popularity and propagation of the web leads to a rapid increase ofweb contents and thus, performance of a web server has become moreimportant than ever. Recently, numerous web servers have beenconstructed to provide a variety of services. Transmission of the webcontents has also increased exponentially compared to past usage. Inconsideration of the trend described in the foregoing, performance ofthe web server is expected to be more important in the future.

SUMMARY

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided amethod of improving performance of a web server by predicting aHypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request including transmitting, to anHTTP requester, at least one web content among web contents includingstatic web contents and dynamic web contents in response to an HTTPrequest, selecting, from the web contents, a required web content to beadditionally transmitted to the HTTP requester and a potential webcontent to be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester,determining, among the potential web content, a web content to bepreloaded, and storing, in a document cache, the required web contentand the web content to be preloaded.

The method may include further registering the web contents.

When a web content to be registered is a static web content, theregistering may include analyzing a substance of the static web contentto be registered, extracting, based on the analyzed substance of thestatic web content, information necessary to select, from the webcontents, the required web content and the potential web content, andstoring the extracted information in a lookup table.

When the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is the static web content, the selecting may includeextracting, based on the lookup table, the required web content and thepotential web content.

When the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is the dynamic web content, the selecting may includeanalyzing a substance of the dynamic web content to be transmitted tothe HTTP requester and extracting, based on the analyzed substance ofthe dynamic web content, the required web content and the potential webcontent.

The determining may be performed based on at least one of memoryoccupancy of the document cache and an HTTP request frequency.

The storing may include searching the document cache for the requiredweb content and the web content to be preloaded, loading, when at leastone of the required web content and the web content to be preloaded isdetermined to be absent in the document cache as a result of thesearching, the at least one web content from an auxiliary memory, andstoring the loaded web content in the document cache.

The storing may be performed asynchronously with the transmitting.

The selecting may be performed during a runtime delay caused bytransmission of the at least one dynamic web content to the HTTPrequester.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provideda web server, including an auxiliary memory, a memory including adocument cache, a network interface to perform communication with anHTTP requester, a web content transmitter to transmit, to the HTTPrequester, at least one web content among web contents including staticweb contents and dynamic web contents in response to an HTTP request, aweb content selector to select, from the web contents, a required webcontent to be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester and apotential web content to be additionally transmitted to the HTTPrequester, a preloading web content determiner to determine, among thepotential web content, a web content to be preloaded, and a documentcache storage unit to store, in the document cache, the required webcontent and the web content to be preloaded.

The web server may further include a web content registerer to registerthe web contents.

When a web content to be registered is a static web content, the webcontent registerer may include a static web content analyzer to analyzea substance of the static web content to be registered, a selectioninformation extractor to extract information necessary to select, fromthe web contents, the required web content and the potential webcontent, based on the analyzed substance of the static web content, anda lookup table storage unit to store the extracted information in alookup table.

When the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is the static web content, the web content selector mayinclude a static web content extractor to extract, based on the lookuptable, the required web content and the potential web content.

When the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is a dynamic web content, the web content selector may includea dynamic web content analyzer to analyze a substance of the at leastone dynamic web content to be transmitted to the HTTP requester, and adynamic web content extractor to extract, based on the analyzedsubstance of the dynamic web content, the required web content and thepotential web content.

The preloading web content determiner may determine the web content tobe preloaded based on at least one of memory occupancy of the documentcache and an HTTP request frequency.

The document cache storage unit may include a web content searcher tosearch the document cache for the required web content and the webcontent to be pre loaded, a web content loader to load, when at leastone of the required web content and the web content to be preloaded isdetermined to be absent in the document cache as a result of thesearching, the at least one web content from the auxiliary memory, and astorage unit to store the loaded web content in the document cache.

The document cache storage unit may be performed asynchronously with theweb content transmitter.

The web content selector may select, from the web contents, the requiredweb content and the potential web content during a runtime delay causedby transmission of the at least one dynamic web content to the HTTPrequester.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

These and/or other aspects, features, and advantages of the inventionwill become apparent and more readily appreciated from the followingdescription of exemplary embodiments, taken in conjunction with theaccompanying drawings of which:

FIG. 1 is a flowchart illustrating a method of improving performance ofa web server by predicting a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) requestaccording to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example in which a static webcontent is transmitted to an HTTP requester according to an embodimentof the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example in which a dynamic webcontent is transmitted to an HTTP requester according to an embodimentof the present invention; and

FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating a web server according to anembodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Reference will now be made in detail to exemplary embodiments of thepresent invention, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanyingdrawings, wherein like reference numerals refer to the like elementsthroughout. Exemplary embodiments are described below to explain thepresent invention by referring to the accompanying drawings, however,the present invention is not limited thereto or restricted thereby.

When it is determined a detailed description related to a related knownfunction or configuration that may make the purpose of the presentinvention unnecessarily ambiguous in describing the present invention,the detailed description will be omitted here. Also, terms used hereinare defined to appropriately describe the exemplary embodiments of thepresent invention and thus may be changed depending on a user, theintent of an operator, or a custom. Accordingly, the terms must bedefined based on the following overall description of thisspecification.

FIG. 1 is a flowchart illustrating a method of improving performance ofa web server by predicting a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) requestaccording to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 1, in operation 110, at least one web content amongweb contents may be transmitted to an HTTP requester in response to theHTTP request. Here, the web contents may include static web contents anddynamic web contents. Also, the web contents may refer to web contentsprocessed and distributed online. For example, a Hypertext MarkupLanguage (HTML) document may include the web contents. Particularly, theHTTP requester may request a web content to the web server. In thisexample, the HTTP requester may be a client or another web server. Also,the web server may transmit, in response to the HTTP request, the webcontent requested by the HTTP requester. Here, the web server mayinclude a memory including a document cache and an auxiliary memory suchas a hard disk, and store web contents in the document cache or theauxiliary memory. The web server may search for the web contentrequested by the HTTP requester, the web contents stored in the documentcache or the auxiliary memory, and transmit the web content to the HTTPrequester.

In operation 120, from the web contents, a required web content to beadditionally transmitted to the HTTP requester and a potential webcontent to be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester areselected. Here, the required web content may refer to a web content thatmust be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester aftertransmission of a web page requested by the HTTP requester. Thepotential web content may refer to a web content that may beadditionally requested by the HTTP requester.

Also, an amount of time required to select the required web content andthe potential web content may vary based on a type of the web content tobe transmitted to the HTTP requester. The web server may register webcontents. Here, when a web content to be registered is a static webcontent, the required web content and the potential web content may beselected when the static web content is registered. In a case of adynamic web content, the selecting of the required web content and thepotential web content may not be performed when registering the dynamicweb content, due to a characteristic of the dynamic web content beinggenerated upon the HTTP request and transmitted to the HTTP requester.More particularly, a substance of the static web content to beregistered may be analyzed when registering the static web content.Also, based on the analyzed substance of the static web content,information necessary to select the required web content and thepotential web content from the web contents may be extracted. Theinformation necessary for the selecting may be stored in a lookup table.Thus, when the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is the static web content, the required web content and thepotential web content may be extracted based on the lookup table whenregistering the static web content.

When the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is the dynamic web content, the required web content and thepotential web content may be selected from the web contents whentransmitting the at least one dynamic web content to the HTTP requester.Generally, in a case of receiving and transmitting a material betweenthe HTTP requester and the web server through a network, a runtime delaymay occur due to a network transmission. During the runtime delay, therequired web content and the potential web content may be selected. Forexample, the required web content and the potential web content may beeffectively selected through parallel processing, during the runtimedelay. The substance of the at least one dynamic web content to betransmitted to the HTTP requester may be analyzed. Subsequently, theinformation necessary for the selecting may be generated based on theanalyzed substance of the at least one dynamic web content. Based on thegenerated information, the required web content and the potential webcontent may be extracted.

In operation 130, a web content to be preloaded may be determined amongthe potential web content. Here, the web content to be preloaded mayrefer to a web content with a high priority among the potential webcontent and stored, in advance, in the document cache from an auxiliarymemory. More particularly, the web content to be preloaded may bedetermined based on at least one of memory occupancy of the documentcache and an HTTP request frequency. Here, the memory occupancy of thedocument cache may refer to an occupancy taken by the document cache ina memory of the web server. The HTTP request frequency may refer to afrequency of requests made by the HTTP requester that are currentlyentering the web server. For example, when the memory occupancy of thedocument cache is high, a web content with a relatively lower prioritymay be determined to be the web content to be preloaded. Conversely,when the memory occupancy of the document cache is low, only a webcontent with a high priority may be determined to be the web content tobe preloaded, whereas none of the potential web content may bedetermined to be the web content to be preloaded. For example, when theHTTP request frequency is high, a current working ratio of the webserver may increase. Thus, numerous web contents may be stored in thedocument cache and the web content with a high priority may bedetermined as the web content to be preloaded. Conversely, when the HTTPrequest frequency is low, a lower number of web contents may be storedin the document cache. Thus, the web content with a low priority may bedetermined as the web content to be preloaded.

In operation 140, the required web content and the web content to bepreloaded may be stored in the document cache. Generally, a web contentmay be stored in the auxiliary memory such as a hard disk and thentransmitted, through a network, to the HTTP requester in response to theHTTP request. However, a speed of reading and writing the auxiliarymemory such as the hard disk may be slower when compared to a speed ofreading and writing the memory and thus, an issue of speed deteriorationmay arise when providing a web service. Conversely, the document cachemay relocate a portion of previously requested web contents from theauxiliary memory to the memory and transmit a web content in the memoryin response to a request identical to a previously made request andthus, an additional access to the auxiliary memory may be reduced.Accordingly, using the document cache may improve the speed of the webservice in comparison to use of the auxiliary memory. However, storing,in the memory, the web contents stored in the auxiliary memory may notbe possible, in general, due to memory limitations. According to anembodiment of the present invention, the required web content and theweb content to be preloaded may be stored in the document cache andthus, the document cache may be used more effectively and a responsespeed of the web server may be improved. During transmission of the atleast one web content to the HTTP requester, the required web contentand the web content to be preloaded may be stored in the document cache,which may be performed asynchronous with the transmission of the atleast one web content to the HTTP requester. More particularly, therequired web content and the web content to be preloaded may be searchedfor in the document cache. When at least one of the required web contentand the web content to be preloaded is determined to be absent in thedocument cache as a result of the search, the at least one web contentabsent in the document cache may be loaded from the auxiliary memory. Inthis case, the at least one web content absent in the document cache maybe loaded from the auxiliary memory based on the memory occupancy of thedocument cache. Also, when a portion of the required web content and theweb content to be preloaded may not be stored in the document cache dueto limitations of the document cache, the required web content may bestored on a preferential basis. In this case, the web content to bepreloaded may be stored in the document cache on a priority basis.

According to an embodiment of the present invention, the at least oneweb content absent in the loaded document cache may be stored in thedocument cache and thus, the required web content and the web content tobe preloaded may be provided more swiftly in response to a future HTTPrequest.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example in which a static webcontent is transmitted to an HTTP requester according to an embodimentof the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 2, a web server 220 may include a document cache 221,a lookup table 222, and an auxiliary memory 223. When the web server 220receives an HTTP request for a static web content from an HTTP requester210, the web server 220 may search the document cache 221 or theauxiliary memory 223 for at least one static web content in response tothe HTTP request for the static web content and transmit an HTTPresponse. Also, simultaneously with transmission of the requested staticweb content, the web server 220 may search for necessary information,using the lookup table 222 calculated in advance when registering thestatic web content, to select a required web content to be additionallytransmitted and a potential web content to be additionally transmittedto the HTTP requester from web contents. The web server 220 may selectthe required web content and the potential web content based on thefound information. Also, the web server 220 may determine, among the webcontents, a web content to be preloaded based on at least one of memoryoccupancy of the document cache 221 and an HTTP request frequency. Thus,the web server 220 may search the document cache for the required webcontent and the web content to be preloaded. Here, when the required webcontent and the web content to be preloaded is absent in the documentcache 221, the web server 220 may load, from the auxiliary memory 223,the required web content and the absent web content to be preloaded inthe document cache 221 and store the same in the document cache 221.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example in which a dynamic webcontent is transmitted to an HTTP requester according to an embodimentof the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 3, when a web server 320 receives an HTTP request forthe dynamic web content from an HTTP requester 310, the web server 320may search a document cache 321 or an auxiliary memory 323 for at leastone dynamic web content in response to the HTTP request and transmit anHTTP response. Also, simultaneously with transmission of the requesteddynamic web content, the web server 320 may analyze a substance of theat least one dynamic web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester, which may be performed asynchronously with the transmissionof the at least one dynamic web content. The web server 320 may extract,based on the analyzed substance of the at least one dynamic web content,a required web content to be additionally transmitted and a potentialweb content to be additionally transmitted. Also, the web server 320 maydetermine, among the potential web content, a web content to bepreloaded based on at least one of memory occupancy of the documentcache 321 and an HTTP request frequency. The web server 320 may searchthe document cache 321 for a related web content 322 such as therequired web content and the web content to be preloaded. Here, when therelated web content 322 is absent in the document cache 321, the webserver 320 may load, from the auxiliary memory 323, the related webcontent 322 absent in the document cache 321 and store the content inthe document cache 321. Thus, when a future HTTP request for the webcontent stored in the document cache 321 is received from the HTTPrequester 310, the requested web content may be immediately provided tothe HTTP requester 310 without an access to the auxiliary memory 323.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating a web server according to anembodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 4, the web server may include a memory 410 including adocument cache 411, an auxiliary memory 420, and a network interface 430performing communication with an HTTP requester.

A web content transmitter 440 may transmit at least one web contentamong web contents to the HTTP requester, in response to an HTTPrequest.

A web content selector 450 may select, from the web contents, a requiredweb content to be additionally transmitted to the HTTP requester and apotential web content to be additionally transmitted to the HTTPrequester.

A preloading web content determiner 460 may determine, among thepotential web content, a web content to be preloaded.

A document cache storage unit 470 may store, in the document cache 411,the required web content and the web content to be preloaded.

Descriptions of a web server provided with reference to FIGS. 1 through3 may be applied to FIG. 4 and thus, repeated detailed descriptions ofthe web server of FIG. 4 are omitted herein for conciseness.

The above-described exemplary embodiments of the present invention maybe recorded in non-transitory computer-readable media including programinstructions to implement various operations embodied by a computer. Themedia may also include, alone or in combination with the programinstructions, data files, data structures, and the like. Examples ofnon-transitory computer-readable media include magnetic media such ashard disks, floppy disks, and magnetic tape; optical media such as CDROM discs and DVDs; magneto-optical media such as floptical discs; andhardware devices that are specially configured to store and performprogram instructions, such as read-only memory (ROM), random accessmemory (RAM), flash memory, and the like. Examples of programinstructions include both machine code, such as produced by a compiler,and files containing higher level code that may be executed by thecomputer using an interpreter. The described hardware devices may beconfigured to act as one or more software modules in order to performthe operations of the above-described exemplary embodiments of thepresent invention, or vice versa.

Although a few exemplary embodiments of the present invention have beenshown and described, the present invention is not limited to thedescribed exemplary embodiments. Instead, it would be appreciated bythose skilled in the art that changes may be made to these exemplaryembodiments without departing from the principles and spirit of theinvention, the scope of which is defined by the claims and theirequivalents.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method of improving performance of a web serverbased on prediction of a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request, themethod comprising: transmitting, to an HTTP requester, at least one webcontent among web contents comprising static web contents and dynamicweb contents, in response to an HTTP request; selecting, from the webcontents, a required web content to be additionally transmitted to theHTTP requester and a potential web content to be additionallytransmitted to the HTTP requester; determining, among the potential webcontent, a web content to be preloaded; storing, in a document cache,the required web content and the web content to be preloaded; andregistering the web contents, wherein, when a web content to beregistered is a static web content, the registering comprises: analyzinga substance of the static web content to be registered; extracting,based on the analyzed substance of the static web content, informationnecessary to select, from the web contents, the required web content andthe potential web content; and storing the extracted information in alookup table.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein, when the at least oneweb content to be transmitted to the HTTP requester is the static webcontent, the selecting comprises: extracting, based on the lookup table,the required web content and the potential web content.
 3. The method ofclaim 1, wherein, when the at least one web content to be transmitted tothe HTTP requester is a dynamic web content, the selecting comprises:analyzing a substance of the at least one dynamic web content to betransmitted to the HTTP requester; and extracting, based on the analyzedsubstance of the at least one dynamic web content, the required webcontent and the potential web content.
 4. The method of claim 1, whereinthe determining is performed based on at least one of memory occupancyof the document cache and an HTTP request frequency.
 5. The method ofclaim 1, wherein the storing comprises: searching the document cache forthe required web content and the web content to be preloaded; loading,when at least one of the required web content and the web content to bepreloaded is determined to be absent in the document cache as a resultof the searching, the at least one web content absent in the documentcache from an auxiliary memory; and storing the loaded web content inthe document cache.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein the storing isperformed asynchronously with the transmitting.
 7. The method of claim3, wherein the selecting is performed during a runtime delay caused bytransmission of the at least one dynamic web content to the HTTPrequester.
 8. A web server, comprising: an auxiliary memory; a memorycomprising a document cache; a network interface to performcommunication with an HTTP requester; a web content transmitter totransmit, to the HTTP requester, at least one web content among webcontents comprising static web contents and dynamic web contents, inresponse to an HTTP request; a web content selector to select, from theweb contents, a required web content to be additionally transmitted tothe HTTP requester and a potential web content to be additionallytransmitted to the HTTP requester; a preloading web content determinerto determine, among the potential web content, a web content to bepreloaded; a document cache storage unit to store, in the documentcache, the required web content and the web content to be preloaded; anda web content registerer to register the web contents, wherein, when aweb content to be registered is a static web content, the web contentregisterer comprises: a static web content analyzer to analyze asubstance of the static web content to be registered; a selectioninformation extractor to extract information necessary to select, fromthe web contents, the required web content and the potential webcontent, based on the analyzed substance of the static web content; anda lookup table storage unit to store the extracted information in alookup table.
 9. The web server of claim 8, wherein, when the at leastone web content to be transmitted to the HTTP requester is the staticweb content, the web content selector comprises: a static web contentextractor to extract, based on the lookup table, the required webcontent and the potential web content.
 10. The web server of claim 8,wherein, when the at least one web content to be transmitted to the HTTPrequester is a dynamic web content, the web content selector comprises:a dynamic web content analyzer to analyze a substance of the at leastone dynamic web content to be transmitted to the HTTP requester; and adynamic web content extractor to extract, based on the analyzedsubstance of the dynamic web content, the required web content and thepotential web content.
 11. The web server of claim 8, wherein thepreloading web content determiner determines the web content to bepreloaded based on at least one of memory occupancy of the documentcache and an HTTP request frequency.
 12. The web server of claim 8,wherein the document cache storage unit comprises: a web contentsearcher to search the document cache for the required web content andthe web content to be preloaded; a web content loader to load, when atleast one of the required web content and the web content to bepreloaded is determined to be absent in the document cache as a resultof the searching, the at least one web content absent in the documentcache from the auxiliary memory; and a storage unit to store the loadedweb content in the document cache.
 13. The web server of claim 8,wherein the document cache storage unit is performed asynchronously withthe web content transmitter.
 14. The web server of claim 10, wherein theweb content selector selects, among the web contents, the required webcontent and the potential web content during a runtime delay caused bytransmission of the at least one dynamic web content to the HTTPrequester.